My last entry turned into an interesting forum, thank you all for your participation- Let's start a second session on the same topic:)
Cultural values evolve and it should (hopefully for the best). At the beginning of last century the first Diasporans, survivors of the Genocide, had arranged and mail order marriages.
At least two fictitious works deal with this subject matter, the play written by Richard Kalinoski, The Beast on the Moon, and Zabelle, a novel by Nancy Kricorian. In both Armenian heroines have arranged marriages and immigrate to US to meet their husbands to be.
A non-fiction book, biography of Arshille Gorki mentions his parents' marriage (survivors of Turkish atrocities), as being arranged by seniors for ensuring lives and physical continuity of Armenians.
30-40 years later Armenian men from Middle East immigrated to Northern America and some of them returned to Middle East to marry a girl from their own original country and sometimes from the same town. I am not talking about childhood sweethearts. You think there were no Armenian girls in the countries/cities they lived in? Or perhaps they thought that Middle-Eastern-Armenian girls from the same country or town were more Armenian than the girls in America who just like them had adapted to the ways of their new society.
Two guys from Northern America who volunteered to serve in Armenia during 1990-1994 in the past four years came back and choose Hayasdantzi girls. Eventually they hope to make enough money and move back to Hayasdan. Perhaps they think and hope that Hayasdantzi girl will agree to come back to live in Hayasdan.
On personal level, marrying couples are consenting adults and they do what's right for them: for love (hopefully), survival, financial, and biological reasons.
Eventually we all might benefit from these marriages: it might help in bringing Spurk and Hayasdan closer. We can all chose to look at mismatched marriages (not all of them are) as spectators and say it's their own business, we can also say it happens everywhere on the world, we're no exception.
On another level we can accept that there's cultural (including family) pressure on Armenian girls (who unlike third world countries are educated) to marry which sometimes forces some of them to make very unsuitable marriages with the first spurkahi and/or even odar who asks her hand even when she has met this person only 10 days ago.
I agree with you, Vahan, Lancaster does not represent US. But as a Hayasdantzi do you think Yerevan represents Armenia? If we did a survey from Lori region to Meghri what do you think the average marriage age would be?
I don't see Hayasdantzi women marrying a Spurkahi for fortune. Maybe some are marrying into money but not all. A few might be marrying to leave the country, and that reflects the mood the country is in.
Armenia has thousands are cultural and family values that we should all be proud of. But when we see problems, keeping our heads in the sand would not help solving it. Admitting it is the first step.
Armenia is exporting brides and it is also exporting babies for adoption. But that's another story that I don't want to touch. Not now.
Cultural values evolve and it should (hopefully for the best). At the beginning of last century the first Diasporans, survivors of the Genocide, had arranged and mail order marriages.
At least two fictitious works deal with this subject matter, the play written by Richard Kalinoski, The Beast on the Moon, and Zabelle, a novel by Nancy Kricorian. In both Armenian heroines have arranged marriages and immigrate to US to meet their husbands to be.
A non-fiction book, biography of Arshille Gorki mentions his parents' marriage (survivors of Turkish atrocities), as being arranged by seniors for ensuring lives and physical continuity of Armenians.
30-40 years later Armenian men from Middle East immigrated to Northern America and some of them returned to Middle East to marry a girl from their own original country and sometimes from the same town. I am not talking about childhood sweethearts. You think there were no Armenian girls in the countries/cities they lived in? Or perhaps they thought that Middle-Eastern-Armenian girls from the same country or town were more Armenian than the girls in America who just like them had adapted to the ways of their new society.
Two guys from Northern America who volunteered to serve in Armenia during 1990-1994 in the past four years came back and choose Hayasdantzi girls. Eventually they hope to make enough money and move back to Hayasdan. Perhaps they think and hope that Hayasdantzi girl will agree to come back to live in Hayasdan.
On personal level, marrying couples are consenting adults and they do what's right for them: for love (hopefully), survival, financial, and biological reasons.
Eventually we all might benefit from these marriages: it might help in bringing Spurk and Hayasdan closer. We can all chose to look at mismatched marriages (not all of them are) as spectators and say it's their own business, we can also say it happens everywhere on the world, we're no exception.
On another level we can accept that there's cultural (including family) pressure on Armenian girls (who unlike third world countries are educated) to marry which sometimes forces some of them to make very unsuitable marriages with the first spurkahi and/or even odar who asks her hand even when she has met this person only 10 days ago.
I agree with you, Vahan, Lancaster does not represent US. But as a Hayasdantzi do you think Yerevan represents Armenia? If we did a survey from Lori region to Meghri what do you think the average marriage age would be?
I don't see Hayasdantzi women marrying a Spurkahi for fortune. Maybe some are marrying into money but not all. A few might be marrying to leave the country, and that reflects the mood the country is in.
Armenia has thousands are cultural and family values that we should all be proud of. But when we see problems, keeping our heads in the sand would not help solving it. Admitting it is the first step.
Armenia is exporting brides and it is also exporting babies for adoption. But that's another story that I don't want to touch. Not now.
posted by Nigol at 4:52 PM
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